Of Fire and Fairy Tales
by Angelic-Siren
Summary: Rin is gone...The shards are lost...And one Wiccan, from Kagome's time, has her fate in the tortured hands of a Demon Lord's tragedy striken heart. Sessh-OC (extended plotline)
1. Prologue

Of Fire and Fairy Tales Angelic-Siren Prologue 

The quest for the shards of the Sheko No Tama has now spanned two years. Kagome and Inuyasha have trekked hundreds of miles to gather the gems, but have less than half. It is becoming harder for Kagome to find the shards. She can no longer find as many as fast as when their search first began. This means two things: Their search is almost over, yet there is so very much work left to be done. 

To ensure that they can find the shards before Naraku can absorb their power, Kagome makes a desperate suggestion, to call in a psychic in the hopes that two magic seeking minds will be better than one. She turns to a friend from her international high school, who studies such things, for help. Convinced that her friend is the assistance they need, Kagome takes her back to the past to join their cause. The saga gains a new chapter, her name is La Fay. 

Meanwhile, in the west, Sesshoumaru has been devastated by loss and is wavering on the brink of his sanity. His dominance is being challenged by the other lords of the regent, but in his depressed stupor, Sesshoumaru doesn't care. Riddled with guilt, he needs something or someone to fill the void. His servants pray that someone can be found, else their future is uncertain. 

In the midst of all this, a concealed spider is plotting. 


	2. Searching for Answers

Of Fire and Fairytales 

Angelic-Siren

Chapter 1 Searching for Answers

Shadows shifted lazily in the firelight. Their meal long over and the day spent and wasted yet again, the group sat brooding at their camp. Drama was thick in the air as when they had first joined forces, but it had grown to be only an undertone for anything that happened, there were always, _always_, bigger problems now. Talk was minimal because no one wished to discus defeat, especially to that creature. Everything was building against them, time, power, resources, _the will to fight_… and winter was fast approaching. Things were indeed getting harder but no one would admit it, not this night, not any. The hunter, the monk, the kit, the miko, and the dog, silent. It was weird. 

The far off sounds of small birds of pray made the quiet all the more eerie, but the kit, asleep contently at the side of his false mother the miko, seemed not to notice at all. The hunter sat scarping the edges of her bone weapon smooth to kill added sparks and background noise to the uneasy evening. The monk sat cross-legged near her but, strangely, instead of intently watching her, he paid little attention to anything but the flying cinders from the fire. The miko lay back against the tree behind her sleeping pallet with a book of myths, hoping to find something useful to their quest. She sighed, setting the book aside, and looked up in time to catch her hanyou guardian looking back down at her before snapping his gaze away as if he had never looked. 

Kagome set her chin in one hand and stared up at him intently, knowing that to look at anyone this way would draw their attention. Inuyasha flicked several short glances at her from the corner of his eye. He growled at himself. _Weak_ he cursed. 

He turned to stare her down. "What?!" 

She sat up, startled. "Oh, nothing. I was just noticing… your hair's gotten longer." 

His ears atop his head relaxed. "Yeah. I hate what you did to yours, I'm compensating I guess." 

Kagome ran her fingers through her chin length black hair as she muttered a little "oh" of disappointment. She dropped her gaze to the fire with a sullen look. Inuyasha glanced at the flames but couldn't see whatever she was seeing. He crossed his arms, had he done it again? He cursed himself again. No matter what he tried to say it never came out as the message he wanted, he was beginning to grow annoyed with her for not understanding and with himself for not making it clear. Inuyasha sighed out loud. 

"I've, uh, been… thinking," she said. Inuyasha sat up straight, hoping, but the others looked up too and he slumped back down. "I think it would help if, well, we got some help." 

"What?" Inuyasha asked raising an eyebrow. 

"I mean if we had two people who could sense shards, it would make it easier to find them before Naraku. It seems logical if you think about it. It would be a lot faster." 

Miroku adjusted the beads around his right hand. "Yeah, but, where are we going to find someone else with that power that isn't trying to kill us?" 

"I agree." Sango chimed, setting down her boomerang. "Our allies are dwindling, Kagome-san. People are growing more fearful than friendly."

Kagome took the book of myths in her lap again. "This book was given to me by my mother, someone who, until two years ago when all this began, didn't believe in monsters or legends. But she bought it from a girl that I know from school who, shall we say, knows her way around such things. I-I don't know for sure, but she might be able to help. I mean she's helped me find my missing chemistry book or math homework before when she knew what to look for, kind of like she was psychic or something. We're kind of friends, and she doesn't have any reason to hate us." 

"You trust her?" Miroku asked. 

Kagome nodded with a half shrug. "Yeah." 

"Then I have to know," he said narrowing his eyes. "What's she look like?" 

Sango slapped him across the back of the head, sending him face first into his sleeping pallet. She rolled her shoulders in satisfaction at his slight yelp. "Books and papers are fine, Kagome-san, but how do you know she can track shards?" 

"I don't know that she can yet… but I could test her. It would be easy. Inuyasha and I will go back to my time and I'll leave him with a shard in a park somewhere out of the way of normal traffic. I'll show her one of the shards and ask her help in finding another. If she can find Inuyasha in a reasonable amount of time, we could ask her for some real help." 

Miroku sat up rubbing the sore spot on his forehead. "Finally, a useful idea." 

"Like you know the meaning of the words." Sango said rolling her eyes. 

"I don't like it." Inuyasha huffed from his perch. 

Kagome frowned from one corner of her mouth. "Fine. I'll take Muroku with me instead." 

Inuyasha sat up, the hair on the back of his neck prickling. He gave a low growl as Muroku raised his eyebrows with the smile of a confident male. "What?!" 

"I most humbly agree, Kagome-chan." The monk said smiling at her. Sango mimicked the hanyou's growl. 

Inuyasha jumped from the tree and landed with a soft thud between Kagome and the creeping monk. "You will sit back and await our return here, with Sango and the brat." He motioned to the sleeping Kitsune behind him. "Kagome and I will leave tonight so we don't waste time. Now sit back and enjoy the evening from your own bed." Inuyasha bared his fangs and flattened his ears while the disappointed Muroku tried to object but gave up, slumping back onto his pallet. Sango gave him a bitter look and turned away. 

Kagome stood up behind Inuyasha. "We don't have to leave tonight, Inuyasha. I just-" 

"We're leaving tonight." He cut in bluntly. He tightened the holster at his waist and hunched slightly to let her climb on his back. "Get on." 

Kagome reached out and almost touched the back of his shoulder to climb on but pulled back. "It would be safer in daylight." She tried to protest. 

"No, that's when the things that are sleeping now will be hunting for our blood tomorrow. Now get on." He commanded glancing over his shoulder. 

She looked into the ever-darkening forest. "But it can't be that far and we shouldn't just leave- Whoa!" 

Inuyasha turned and grabbed her by the waist, jumping off into a silent and quick hover through the starlit woods. She struggled and fussed for several minutes after losing sight of their camp but Inuyasha pretended not to notice. 

"Uh! You lousy, stupid baka!" She huffed. 

"Whatever. But I wouldn't "sit" me in this position, it would crush you too." The shadows hid the slight smirk he got from trapping her high in the air alone with him. 

She pulled her wind-strung hair out of her face with only a half meant scowl. "Why'd you grab me out of nowhere anyway? There was no point in leaving today rather than tomorrow." 

"I don't know, the same reason I've always grabbed you before I guess." Kagome held her breath. "So Muroku couldn't get his hands on you, he's scum no matter what." 

"What?!" 

"What did you expect me to say?" 

"Uh! Just put me down you… uh! Dumb male! You're no better than him either you know! Especially right now! Put me down!" 

Kagome wriggled but Inuyasha held tight, crushed though he was._ I did it again, didn't I?_ "You know he'd be all over you by now, so there is a difference." He just shook his head in answer to her command and tossed her slightly to get a better grip around her trim waist. "You know you could have slept on the way to the well if you had climbed on my back." 

"And have to admit I ever took an order from you? Yeah right!" 

"Would it be so bad?" He asked quietly. 

Kagome thought frantically, rubbing the loose cloth of red kimono between her fingers. What did he mean by that? "… It's a pride thing I guess. If I make anything too easy for you it would make me look cheap." 

Inuyasha frowned. "Cheap? You mean like… easy?" 

"What?! Nooooooo! I mean like... like… like I can't take care of myself. Easy, please! You are just like Muroku." Kagome looked over his shoulder at the landscape they had already passed so he couldn't see her blush in the soft moonlight. _Easy? Man! What's his idea of hard to get? But…he was pretty close. _

Inuyasha turned his attention back to their flight, face flushed at what he had even suggested. He knew Kagome was way too classy to ever qualify as cheap, no matter what she did. But he could just say it. Why couldn't he just say it? He felt her pulse quicken in her side as she turned away from him. Damn it she was a confusing broad! 

Kagome pushed the situation aside, waaayyyyy aside. She had to focus on what they were doing. Help. They needed help. Time was everything and they had next to nothing and that had to be fixed. She felt the warmth of the broken gem hanging around her neck on her skin. Less than half complete, she was afraid to think of where the rest could be, whose hands the other pieces might be in. Naraku wasn't letting up in the least and something had to be done about it. But for god's sake, she was asking a psychic! Why didn't she just call miss Cleo? Kagome prayed, deeply prayed, that this was not just a waste of their already short time. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Children's laughter echoed in though the rooms, down the halls, and across the courtyards before creeping into his chambers by the window at night. It was maddening. She was alive! She was alive not four months ago, but now… The White lord sat on the floor next to the edge of his bed at night thinking. How could he have saved her, at least found her faster? Had he known the fang had limitations he would have… have… 

Winter was fast approaching, the cold wind dancing through his rooms heralded that. The ground over the child's grave would be frozen soon… that's all he could think of. The lightening sky peeked in on him a little later as every day passed, gradually giving up hope that he would ever recover. But he took no notice. To him, night and day could only be told by how well he could hear her voice. Sesshoumaru, Lord of the Western Lands, had fallen; not from power, but from will to live. 

_She was never a large part of my life, _he told himself. _How did she suddenly come to mean so much? _

But she had been an important part of his life, a very small part as to length, but to a demon, what is time? His father's death had turned him to stone, carved and perfect, yet this human's death turns him into a lost child himself, the ultimate irony. Death forges lords and death forges fools. But what decided between the two, he could not see. Yet he could see her, smiling as she braided flowers into his hair, suddenly turn to a mangled and forsaken corps. The vision was there behind his eyes, whether they were closed or not. 

Rin had been missing for two days before he realized her scent was weak in the palace, even in her favorite playing yards and her own room. Sesshoumaru cursed himself silently for that from the beginning. He stormed the grounds looking for her, questioning her maids, but none of them knew where she was, nor did they really care. 

"Jaken!" He hissed as he caught the scent of a toad with something to hide. "Come in here amphibious rat." 

The creature slid the screen to the library open cautiously. "Y-yes, master?" he stuttered, bowing as low as his little green body could. 

Sesshoumaru leveled his deep gold gaze on the lowly servant. "Where is Rin?" 

Jaken gulped when his master's angry eyes fell on him like several tons of bricks. "Well I didn't want to d-distract your grace while you were um, planning the border offensive in the south, so I uh, I-I-"

"Where is she?!" 

The little green thing trembled. "Isawthatbaboonskinleavingthegroundshemust-havetakenher!" 

"When?!" he demanded. 

"Two days ago sire! I didn't know! Please, please, have mercy! I didn't know!" The ugly toad was practically bawling by this time for his own bumpy skin, which Sesshoumaru was beginning to think would make a fine nail file. 

Sesshoumaru grabbed the little green thing by the scruff of the neck and growled, his golden eyes burning a hole through the servant's body. "Show me the way." He barked. Hardly able to keep from wetting himself, Jaken nodded. 

Sesshoumaru held the toad out in front of him as he flew to the outer edge of the palace compound so as not to waist time. Jaken pointed at the high stone wall holding back the expanse of forest from spilling into the courtyard. Sesshoumaru dropped him without slowing down as he raced over the wall and into the depths of the green sea of vines and trees. Ignoring the yelp of his lackey, he sped on at the top speed that his surroundings allowed. In truth, Jaken was glad to be bruised rather than with his infuriated master. 

Sesshoumaru sniffed. He could find the scent from here; he didn't need that worthless little bump anymore. It only took a moment for him to focus in on the trail. Sesshoumaru was so angry at the baboon-clad bastard by this time that he could practically see the path that he had left as he flew through the night. 

_If you've hurt her, Naraku, death will not even be an escape for you. _

Soon after sunrise the next day, the already dense foliage was too thick and compact for him to fly through. Sesshoumaru set down on the forest floor without changing his pace. Creepers and thorns tore at his robes but he didn't notice. Only after several miles did Naraku's scent begin to strengthen. Sesshoumaru stopped as he reached a large bamboo grove. He could smell Naraku, but not Rin. He began to panic. The scent trails were too crossed, he'd never find Naraku, and gods know what had happened to the girl. 

Sesshoumaru looked around wildly, trying to figure out where he had lost her scent. A short and maniacal laugh came from a tree high above him. Sesshoumaru looked up to see Naraku stretched out on a branch smiling down at him from under the baboon skin hood. A deep growl rumbled from deep in the White lord's throat. 

"Dog's must be slow," Naraku said standing up. "In body as in mind. What kept you, Sesshoumaru?" 

Sesshoumaru restrained himself from rocketing up there and slashing the hanyou's throat out. "Where is she?" he demanded. 

"Oh, yes. The human whelp. Huh. Pity, but you're far to late for that little brat." 

"What?!" Sesshoumaru clawed the base of the tree and in one swipe from the poisonous talons the tree fell. The crack and shudder of the looming giant shook the forest before it even came crashing to the ground. But Naraku was away in another tree long before then. 

His cackling laughter was all but drowned out by the roar of the falling tree and Sesshoumaru's unearthly howl. "Oh come now, quiet yourself." Naraku managed to command through his laughter. "I didn't say she was dead, even though she is." Sesshoumaru roared like no demon could, his vision red with anger, unable to comprehend what he'd been told. "Oh for gods sakes man, you make like you have no back up." 

Sesshoumaru had been ready to strike at Naraku's next perch when he remembered the fang at his waist. "Where?!" he roared, his voice deep and animalistic. 

Naraku shrugged and waved off in one direction. "Over there somewhere. I haven't checked in a while, something could have dragged her off." 

Sesshoumaru ran in the direction he was pointed. He slowed and checked the ground. She had struggled, he could tell. 

"You would have been so proud of how that child fought! She even cursed and swore you'd kill me! But that was just on the flight here. I must admit, the girl had a right hook to kill, at least for a human." Naraku taunted as he jumped from branch to branch. "Don't worry though. Even though she fought, it was fast and relatively painless. This is me we're talking about." 

Sesshoumaru blocked him out and continued to search. He could smell her again, her blood at least. He came to a small grassy drop only a foot or two down and saw the purple cloth of the child's kimono from under the branch of a thorn bush. 

Naraku stopped just over-head. "I suppose where she chose to die was a good one at least. From here it doesn't look like anything has gotten to her." 

Sesshoumaru, stunned and disbelieving, stumbled down the small incline and landed on his knees. He tried to stand but nearly had to crawl to the place where Rin was laying. He pushed back the thorny branches slowly. Naraku was right, the body hadn't been touched since the attack. Several gashes adorned her new kimono and pail skin, the blood long dried. One across her forehead, one across her belly, several on her arms, and the killing blow across her neck. Her sweet brown eyes were still open but glassy, empty of life now, yet still showing her last emotion: terror. 

Sesshoumaru didn't touch her. He reached to his side with his real arm and brought out his father's fang. The sword felt heavy in his hands looming over the child's body. It had never felt this heavy before. He swung the blade twice, then once more to be sure, cris-crossing the strokes over her torso. He set the sword beside him and waited for his sensitive ears to pick up her heartbeat, but minutes passed and nothing happened. Sesshoumaru inspected the wounds, they hadn't begun to heal. Absolutely nothing had happened. He tried again, doubling his strokes this time, nothing. 

Sesshoumaru turned up to Naraku. "What have you done?" He was unable to shout this as he had intended, his strength seemed to be drained just at seeing her. "Answer me." 

Naraku shook his head with his trademark smile. "I merely killed her, your timing is what couldn't save her. It isn't my fault." 

Sesshoumaru looked down at the sword. "But the Tensaiga-" 

"Can't bring back those that have been dead for three days or more." Naraku waved his hand. "I did a little research and wanted to see if it was true." 

Sesshoumaru dropped the fang onto the grass beside him. "I saved her once before…"

"You mean the first time? Oh Sesshoumaru," he shook his head. "That wasn't even a day yet. Poor thing. She had to journey to the next life all alone, too, without even a kiss goodbye from Daddy of the Western Lands. I wonder if she's mad at you?" 

Naraku smiled again but didn't laugh as he disappeared, leaving the White lord alone with his guilty conscience, he wasn't that cruel. Sesshoumaru sat on his knees in the same place beside the dead girl Rin from noon to sunset, praying for any sign of life. Finally, as the moon was rising, he had convinced himself that she was not coming back and closed her eyes. His hand froze on her face as the tears of centuries broke his perfect mask and drove him to the ground at her side. Why had he only brought a sword that couldn't kill? He lay weeping beside her body for hours, betraying all strength he had worked to gain as a demon. 

When he at last found some amount of composure Sesshoumaru removed his outer shirt kimono and rapped her in it gently. He passed one clawed finger over her cheek before covering her face with the makeshift burial cloth. He slid the Tensaiga back into its sheath. _Useless thing._ He told himself. On week legs, the Lord of the West stood with the limp bundle in his arms, cradling her as he had when she was merely sleeping. He rose slowly into the night sky to fly her home one last time. 

Rin… 

Jaken watched from the doorway of his master's outer chambers, having to peek around the half open door to the inner room. He had finally fallen asleep for the first time in four months, so the lowly servant was relieved. Jaken knew his master's suffering was his fault, but he hadn't realized losing a human could be such a blow. He wondered if perhaps it would help his lord if he went to one of the courtyards and hung himself from a tree branch. There were worse ways to die in the service of his master. 

The little green thing sighed inwardly. It was more as if Sesshoumaru had been the one who died, not that little girl. He'd never seen his master so… so… _depressed_. As a boy, his mother had practically danced on his father's grave while he observed silently. When his mother met an, um, untimely end, he simply tossed a flower at the grave and told her to remain in hell. Yet for this child, this human child, he had done everything for her but dug her grave with his own bare hands… he had a gardener bring him a shovel. It should have been humiliating, but he didn't care. It had been a humbling experience for the whole court, who still refused to speak of the incident. 

But the other lords were talking plenty, and that wasn't good. If they talked too much they might stop joking and start attacking. The weakness that had paralyzed his master had to have some kind of remedy, if it didn't the Western Lands could be destroyed. Curse that blasted hanyou! This was his doing but he would never pay the price if Sesshoumaru never recovered. When had the life of a humble servant get twisted into some melodrama fairy tail? He had to help his master, the alternative made his neck ache just thinking about it.


	3. Enter the Wicken, Stage Right

A/n: Siren Says Hi: This chapter is mostly about introducing La Fay, which is my main concern. From here on out chapters will be longer, plots thicker, so get cozy this could take a while, though I hope to post again very soon. Okay, soon as school year permits anyway. Remember, as much as I love Sesshoumaru and all those other characters that are only here because they make things easier to write about, I do not own them, which breaks my cold unfeeling black heart. 

Enjoy!

Of Fire And Fairy Tales

By Angelic Siren

Chapter 2: Enter The Wicken, Stage Right

La Fay looked up at the sky from between the leaves of the trees surrounding the clearing. She pulled a few stray gold hairs from her forehead and sighed tucking them behind her ear. "So, Kay, is this suppose to be the first of our many little scrambles while we're here?" 

Kagome pulled herself over the side of the well and plopped down on the lush grass to breath. "Please don't be a smart ass La Fay. You know how much is riding on this working out." 

"I'll do my job, no big deal. You just look so stressed." La Fay held out her hand to her friend to help her up. 

Kagome took it and stood. "Thanks. I am kinda tweaked, I guess. If it didn't put the world in danger I'd take a vacation." 

La Fay shook her head with a smile. "You need it as much as you deserve it girl. Trust me, you are a mess." 

Kagome was about to respond when there was a crash from in the bushes from the direction the village. There were a few shouts and a small orange tailed child ran out from the brush and jumped at Kagome, latching onto her leg with a happy greeting. 

"Kagome-chan! You're back! Did you bring me anything? Candy? Huh? Huh?" 

"Kagome," La Fay said pointing. "There appears to be a squirrel on your leg." 

Kagome lost her balance and landed back on the ground with a soft thud. She began to laugh as the little Kitsune attached to her attempted a frightening growl at La Fay. 

"You're a baka! I'm a fox demon, shows you! The Mighty Shippo!" He gave a child's equivalent of a growl. 

La Fay raised an eyebrow at the cub. "Don't make me bite you." She said baring her slightly filed canines as she spoke. "And when you growl, you have to pull it from way down deep or it just sounds like a Hummer backing over a frightened chipmunk. Go from the diaphragm, like this," She lowered her head and managed a fairly convincing and definitely unnerving cougar like growl. 

"What was that?" Kagome said, staring at her friend as if she were crazy. 

"That was me doing my babysitter thing. Your little brother knows all about it. Shuts em up every time." 

Kagome glanced down at Shippo, who had gone stiff, his tail poofed out as if he'd been struck by lightning. "I see." 

"Well you certainly took your time getting back." Inuyasha said as he crossed the clearing toward them. La Fay blinked. Kagome had told her about the hanyou boy but seemed to have forgotten a few details, like the fact that he was _this_ attractive. Kagome had half sighed half giggled her way through a brief description that she had probably thought wasn't too obvious, but then again Kagome was kind of naive. La Fay was hardly awed by the golden glared male, but perhaps taller and if he groomed his hair a little differently 

"Preparing takes time, Inuyasha. We needed a few days." Kagome said pulling the still stiff Shippo off her leg and interrupting La Fay's thoughts. She looked the Kitsune over before setting him down beside her. La Fay shook off the thought and stooped to help Kagome up again but Inuyasha pushed past her and pulled the teen miko to her feet. "Thanks Inuyasha." She mumbled as he took her big yellow backpack from her. 

He slung the bag over his shoulder. "Neh." 

La Fay followed behind as Kagome semi-jogged to keep up with the white haired hanyou on their way back to the village. She smiled to herself, thinking it was about time Kagome had a boyfriend of her own instead of just nodding politely when she talked about her own short term relationships. La Fay carried the rigid Shippo by the tail and lifted him to eye level only once when she was sure Inuyasha wasn't paying attention. "Is it just me, or do these two totally need to get a room?" She asked the unconscious child. Up ahead, Kagome shouted angrily before commanding a swift "sit" and Inuyasha hit the ground. She took her backpack and began to drag it the rest of the way as the hanyou struggled to free himself from the earth that apparently wanted to eat his face. La Fay rolled her gray tinged blue eyes. "That's a yes in the form of modern dance, I'm guessing. Now on to meet the other freaks of the ages." 

* * * * * * * * *

"Okay, first encounters very rarely go well but I think that takes the cake." Kagome said inspecting the damage La Fay had done with Miroku's help. 

The monk lay face down several yards away under a large, formerly stacked, pile of firewood, nearly unconscious but breathing. _Pity_ La Fay thought to herself. "Boy trouble always was my specialty, if you didn't know." 

"You mean, if we couldn't tell." Sango corrected. "And nice distance by the way. Most girls can't hit him that hard the first time he pulls something." 

La Fay shrugged. "Like grandma always said, "When it comes to Mr. Wrong, it's all in the wrist."" 

Even Kaede nodded from her place in the shadows of her hut. "Old women are wise, and so are the young women that listen to them."

Inuyasha rolled his eyes. "That's all we need, the young brats sounding like old broads! Will you shut up and stop poisoning what's not that great already!" 

"Ye should watch your tongue, boy." The old lady said with a twitch of a smile. 

"Neh?" 

"Sit!" Kagome barked, and down he went. Inuyasha slammed into the ground with painful impact at Kagome's feet. "Poison what's already- you baka! Uh! I swear all men are trash!" 

"No comment." Sango, Kaede, and La Fay said in unison. 

* * * * * * * * *

"So Kaede is little sister miko, to the dead miko, that's like you in a past life, that's back from the dead, to kill your boyfriend that was her lap dog first, and she's a zombie working with Naraku to. Oh god, I had it straight this morning!" La Fay said pushing her fist to her forehead as she and Kagome peeled potatoes for dinner. 

Sango controlled a laugh from the pot she was stirring in the hearth. "So let me try this again: Naraku is a hanyou that was a vengeful human with a bad past, bad heart, bad soul, and bad ideas rolling around his head before he decided to put them to use stealing the Shekon jewel." 

"Uh huh." Kagome said picking up another potato. 

"He impersonated both Inuyasha and Kikyo to turn them against each other, pushing Kikyo into a life threatening battle and Inuyasha into stealing the jewel. Ticked, dying and confused, Kikyo seals Inuyasha to a tree, dies, and has the jewel burned with her, there by causing it to reappear when she's reborn as _you_?" 

"That's right, keep going." Kagome said without looking up. 

"So you wound up tangled in your dead self's aftermath fifty years after the whole tree thing, and broke the jewel into the tiny shards that we're trekking around for, collecting strange friends, a diary of your freaky adventures as you fight Naraku, and an assortment of other evil characters to reclaim the shards before Naraku can take over the world, or something like that." 

"Pretty much." Kagome nodded. 

La Fay stabbed the potato she was working on. "That's really screwed up you know." 

* * * * * * * * *

Sesshoumaru stood on the edge, staring into the inky darkness below, deeper than the darkness around. And yet all he saw was a pinnacle of light shining up from the depths where anyone else would have seen nothing. He saw freedom. Freedom just a few hundred feet away, not that far, even with the less than soft, even jagged landing - there it was. It was waiting for him. He could hear whispers of "come, jump," He smiled into the dark pit. "" 

His gold eyes drifted on the shadowy sea, looking for Rin. She'd be waiting for him, a fist full of flowers in hand at The Gates Between, ready to take his hand and lead for the first time, into where else? 

Sesshoumaru cocked his head when he didn't see her. The waves far below became a little clearer as the moon blinked from behind a cloud for just a moment and he stopped his step towards the edge. Out of the corner of his eye he saw two young humans, lovers he guessed, heading for another part of the cliff farther down shore. They reached the edge and stopped for a moment in silence and threw their arms around one another, weeping as they did so. They pulled away and joined hands, nodding one last time before running at the edge of the crag and jumping into the sea. 

As they fell they were torn for each other's grasp and cried out, before disappearing into the rocks and foam below. Sesshoumaru hissed a sigh. There was nothing more satisfying or as pathetic as a human's last cry, but this confused him. The irony of trying to die together, only to be pulled apart at the last second, ruining eternity for them both, he was sure. It was almost funny. 

He looked down the cliff side again to the shallow water below. There was no use in it, he surrendered. Rin wasn't waiting for him now nor would she be anytime soon he guessed. He would wait a while and try again later, maybe she'd be back from conversing with the other dead by then and ready to see him come. He had no intention of wandering the next world looking for her - she was much too good at hide and seek. So he'd wait. Maybe she'd stop playing games in a few months. 

Sesshoumaru shook his head and began to walk back toward his seaside manor. If she ever stopped playing games, she wouldn't be Rin and if he ever stopped thinking as a lord, he wouldn't be much of anything

* * * * * * * * *

La Fay sat up listening to the distant sound of the waves driving themselves against the cliffs in unsettled comfort. She stretched and opened her backpack to find a book to study from for a while, seeing as she wouldn't be sleeping tonight, she knew it. Inuyasha shifted in his light sleep on a branch somewhere above Kagome's pallet with a sigh while Kagome and Shippo remained fast asleep below. Sango breathed evenly across the fire and Miroku kept a respectful distance after a particularly bad bruising earlier that evening. 

Everyone seemed to be at peace but her. La Fay shook it off and took out an old Celtic book of healing Wicca, opened the old binding, and began flipping through in the light of the fire. She tried to convince herself she was really reading for several moments before looking up with a sigh. She felt as though there was something happening that she was missing. She was about to put the book away when she swore she heard a far off scream, maybe two. Everything was silent for a long time. 

__

I must be imagining things. Everybody knows the Banshees haunt moors, not seacoasts, and Salties can't scream if there's a moon. She assured herself it was all imagined by reciting a few other creatures of the dark and their habits so she would calm down. _Besides_, she continued, _Sleeping Beauty in all his glory up there would be wide-awake if there was anything really dangerous around._

* * * * * * * * *

"Alright," Kagome said slinging her pack over her shoulder. "We'll split up today and meet back here in this glade in one week." 

La Fay looked around carefully, taking in every detail of the clearing. "Right, I should know where you are the whole time. Sango and Shippo will come with me; Inuyasha and Miroku will go with you. There are five, maybe six to the south west-" 

"And three or four to the north but the shadows are stronger there, so we'll take those." Kagome jumped in. Inuyasha and Miroku took their places at her side. 

"Hey!" Shippo popped up on Sango's shoulder. "Don't I get a say in this?!" 

"Do not worry Shippo, we will be just fine. Besides, I think you need a vacation from fighting with Inuyasha, don't we all?" Sango added under her breath. 

"I heard that!" Inuyasha barked. 

"Good for you." La Fay said raising her eyebrows and turning away. "Let's move out, people. I feel snow on the horizon. It's an early winter, no doubts, so let's go before we're too cold to move." 

* * * * * * * * *

"Giant rats, yeah, this is entirely why I'm here." La Fay mumbled as she ran under the cover of a large tree, away from the elephant sized rodent demon attacking them. Shippo clung to a branch overhead for dear life while Sango was busy trying to free her boomerang from the base of a large stone sticking straight out of the ground several yards away. 

La Fay pulled out the line on her throwing daggers and began to quickly rewind them. _Oh Athens I hope this works!_ She heard Shippo scream and instinctively looked up, just as he fell from the sky and landed at her feet. 

"Ow." The child groaned. 

La Fay turned around just in time to see the huge rodent demon pull up the tree by its roots with its over grown incisors. "Oh damn"She muttered. 

The beast tossed the tree away threw its head up in a victorious roar, giving La Fay a clear shot at its main artery. She took the shot, sending three Druid blessed blades into the animal's throat and out the back of its neck, killing it instantly and pulling out the two shards as it fell on its side suddenly silent. The daggers landed blade down in the earth a few feet away just as Sango managed to free her bone weapon. 

La Fay trotted over and took up the daggers and shards. "I want a bath. There can't be anything more gross than rat's blood." She said looking over her blood-drenched clothes. 

"Nothing directly comes to mind." Sango agreed. "Where did you get those?" she asked, pointing at the daggers La Fay was cleaning. 

"These?" La Fay held one up. "They're my granda's, back in the old country. Very old, very powerful magic. Takes a sage to handle them right, I don't even come close." 

Sango replaced her weapon to its sheath on her back. "I think you do alright for yourself, and this is coming from a hunter so you know it's true." 

"Thanks Sango, but anyone can toss a sword around. These hold potent Celtic magics, back from when men didn't know the mainland God or His Son. See these?" She pointed to several symbols that showed through the blood. "Runes, the only script that magic ever acknowledged. When I can pen runes that magic bends to, then I am a sage, and then I can use my granda's daggers as they haven't been used in a millennia." 

"Pressure?" Sango asked, raising an eyebrow. 

"Not really." La Fay laughed. "No body in my family has been able to work them right in generations, nobody actually expects me to be the one to do it, especially having only seen the mother isle once." 

"Pity, you'd be more helpful if you could." 

"Oh right Miss "My weapon was stuck in a rock and I was of _no_ assistance whatsoever"!" 

"Oh, shut up!" Sango barked sarcastically. 

"Shut up, both of you!" Shippo slurred, stumbling over towards them uncertainly. "No more rats, no more trees, no more talking! Uh," he fell back on his butt with a yelp. "Make the ringing stop" He slumped over onto the grass unconscious leaving the two women silently amused. 

A/n: Alright, I am so sorry it took me so long to post, it isn't fair to have kept you waiting, so if you want revenge I'll get my History teacher's address and you can go (ahem) _"take care" _of her for me so I have less homework and more time to devote to you and my stories. Don't get me wrong, if I didn't understand history I wouldn't be able to write the way I do but the woman is psychotic and thrives on my suffering, and through mine, yours! Suffering is my business so I know. Anyway, I'm far more motivated when I have fresh reviews, so god damn it, review! And if anyone wants to really syke me up to write, e-mail information about any good (preferably fairly tasteful) fan fictions that you've found to Gothic-Tinkerbell and she will notify me. It's a complicated thing but to make it short, hate my mother for me to help encourage her to get me my own e-mail address, please! 

And remember boys and girls, Inuyasha good, Sponge Bob Square Pants eats your brains and makes you gay and preppy like him. You know it's true so don't flame me for saying it because somebody had to. 


	4. Snow Angels

A/N: Siren says sorry: It's been too long, but the next chapter isn't far behind cause I was kinda alternating working on them so don't stone me okay? I don't own Inuyasha, bla bla bla. 

By the way: WATCH MAD MAD HOUSE ON SCIFI CHANAL! Don the vampire is hot and normal people cry a lot. It's fun. 

NOTE: It has been noted that I have been spelling Wiccan wrong in my fanfic. I can't be hung or hated for my stupidity though because I didn't know! And I'm not apologizing either cause it's not my fault. Yet, I would hate to use magic incorrectly so this fact has been noted and spelling changes will gradually be made over previous chapters. Please believe me when I say I really don't know what I'm writing about, vampires are my specialty, not Wicca. 

Of Fire and Fairy Tales

By Angelic Siren

Chapter Three: Snow Angels

Evil hung in the air like a dense fog, silent and unmoving, obscuring all other feeling and all other senses, pressing down with force to stop breath and break ribs. Deep within it there were shadows. They sat together not even so much as breathing, just waiting to see what the world as its stage and its actors would do next. There was no script, because it was simply more interesting that way. 

The snakelike locks of the shadow from which all the others sprang were for once pulled back into a lose ponytail as he watched the movement of all things as they passed through his domain with a silent smirk of amusement. 

Sesshoumaru slid the door of his chambers open and stepped into the hall. A few of the servants paused when he walked by, having nearly forgotten what their lord looked like during his long withdrawal. He carried himself only half as heavily as he felt, choosing to keep the rest of his mourning and bitterly justified self-hate to himself, allowing it only to interfere with his dreams now, the only place where he decided he had no control, all else still bowed to him if he demanded it, he would make it, even death. 

The child was lost. He accepted that much and would have to accept it every day for the rest of his several hundred years. His thoughts now had to be on his kingdom and those that threatened it, revenge was something he could focus on later in life, when things where more secure and any injury to himself was of less concern. For now, he finalized as his reason, he could not die or shame would return to his family as the power and rule of the western lands shifted back to his mutt bastard brother, and he would sooner live through hell, die, and then go through it again more literally then see that happen. 

He gripped the boa that graced his shoulder at the very thought of having a hanyou ruining the empire that he, his father, and his father's fathers had worked so hard to build and keep stable. _That brat could rise to power and topple the whole pyramid of state in Japan in the same day._ Sesshoumaru thought within himself. The western lords were a legacy, one that he was determined not to have crumble at the hands of a _human female_, not his father's nor his. 

__

Rin 

Sesshoumaru sighed as he entered his study, scrolls piled high around his low desk, all of them letters of mock concern of the condition of his lands from other lords, along with offers of help for a price. He withheld the growl that burned in the back of his throat. If there was any down fall to being a great lord, it had to be putting up with the other ones. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Sango gripped her arms against the frosty November air. No Snow. Yet. 

With a sigh she stopped and glanced down at Shippo, who was short of frozen solid. "You know, you'd be warmer on my shoulder than walking on your own." She stated as the little kitsune continued to trudge on shivering violently. 

"Ah, shows what y-you k-know. I'm too tough to f-feel the stupid cold!" 

Sango rolled her eyes. "Well, I'd be warmer anyway. Guess I'm selfish." 

Shippo's cold-drooped ears picked up and he stopped, sticking his nose high in the air. "Well, yeah, but, it's okay. I'll help you." He immediately turned and bounded back to Sango and hopped to her shoulder easily, settling there with a content sigh. 

"I wish I were as tough." La Fay said, her eyebrows raised too high to be serious, but Shippo was too tired to notice. She glanced around at the small clearing that was slowly being blanketed by a fog that was uncommon for such an early afternoon. "You know, I'm not entirely sure this is the meadow where we're supposed to meet the others." 

"But I am sure that it looks damn similar to the last three we've been through." Sango added with a quick look around. "Something doesn't feel right" 

La Fay settled one hand on her knife belt, inspecting the surrounding trees scrupulously. "I know what you mean. Ghost fields back home have an eerily similar vibe. It makes your stomach drop, huh?" 

"Just what I was thinking. Know what I'm thinking now psychic?" Sango began to mentally measure how far the fog was rolling at what pace. 

La Fay was already doing the same thing with the simple conclusion: the fog was moving too fast. "I read auras Sango, not minds, but if we're thinking anything alike you think we should get moving." 

Sango began to cross the thick green carpet of grass to the far side of the clearing. "Exactly." She said with a repressed shudder. 

"It's strange," La Fay said, following slowly after her, looking over her shoulder at the advancing mists. "But I don't feel a presence in this place, nothing living at all, not even something evil enough to spook everything else off." She stopped for a moment beside the upturned roots of a freshly fallen tree, which should have been teeming with life, but all such was conspicuously absent. "There aren't even worms here" La Fay said to the frosty air. She looked around, suddenly aware of her self, standing in the glade _alone_. 

La Fay gritted her teeth as the fog reached the toes of her boots. It seemed almost alive and eager to climb her faded and muddied jeans. Unable to stand the quiet nor see any tracks through the dense fog, La Fay gripped her dagger's handle until her knuckles turned white. "Sango?" she called warily into the trees. Silence answered on for miles. "Sango, really, I can't see you!" _Not even your aura's footprints_. 

She allowed herself a moment to gather her thoughts before panic set in. She had been alone in strange places before, this was little different, she just needed to think clearly, but even her mind was foggy. La Fay felt her chest tighten, this was worse than being claustrophobic, this was being confused and helpless where self-assurance had always reined. 

La Fay tugged the arms of her thin coat down over her fingers as she turned to inspect the forest behind her, beside her, until it seemed to spin in silent mockery. She tried to force the world to focus but with no success. Blindly, she began to wander in the direction she assumed Sango had gone, stopped, turned uncertainly, and altered her course. Her path ran anywhere but straight for hours as several snowflakes dared to slip away from heaven to instigate the first snow. 

* * * * * * * * * *

Sesshoumaru rubbed his shoulder where the latest replacement for his fallen flesh met what remained real. _Disgusting_ He thought within himself. He turned into the cool air of the lengthening Fall with a stiff glare. There was snow in the low lands and it was not showing signs of stopping, yet he had his duties and he would traverse the worst storms to be sure his lands were secure. 

There was an empty coldness in him that was more frozen by far than the weather around him. Trudging on through the snow Sesshoumaru kept his thoughts on his specific task, memories of his lost foster-child playing in the first snow would not help him to accomplish anything. He gritted his teeth and allowed his pace to speed up. 

Approaching the edge of one of the wild forests that had no distinct boundaries from which to mark territorial lines and borders Sesshoumaru suddenly halted, eyes wide, ears alert. The thick mist that obscured everything on the forest floor was unusual, to say the least. He sniffed the air for a source, a powerful and ambitious youkai perhaps? But to no result, either the snow had blanketed the demon's scent or he simply did not exist. In any event, he would press on and meet what would come. Without hesitation he continued into the forest. 

* * * * * * * * * * * 

Kagome sighed with relief as Sango and Miroku came into view through the intensifying snowstorm. Miroku had volunteered to go look for their late companions while she and Inuyasha remained in the designated clearing. Inuyasha remained close to her to avoid letting the brunt of the wind and slush hit her. Wrapped tight in the fir-lined cloak he'd made from a demon bearskin, she was still very thankful for his attentiveness. 

At Inuyasha's gesture toward the approaching snow-laden friends, Kagome was suddenly aware that they were short a member. She jogged forward to meet them, slowed by the snow that was nearly knee deep. "Where's La Fay?" she yelled over the wind. 

"We lost her before Miroku found us an hour ago!" Sango reported. "Must have been lost in the fog!" 

Kagome glanced back at Inuyasha whose brow was knitted with suspicion. "What fog?" He barked through the icy howls. 

Sango looked struck, looking around desperately for proof. Miroku took her arm and tugged her towards the others as Shippo clung fast to her shoulder. "We can't look for her now! We won't even be able to find our tracts in a minute! We have to go back to the village!" He yelled as he steadied the huntress when she stumbled. 

Kagome turned back to Inuyasha, about to protest for support when he lifted her off her feet and nodded to Miroku before heading toward Kaede's village. 

Kagome punched his shoulder as he turned into the wind. "Inuyasha, you baka! We have to find her! She could freeze!" 

"And so could we! We're heading back, we'll look once the storm dies down." He shook his head, sending puffs of collected snow into the wind behind them. "La Fay will manage so shut up and keep warm! You're no good to anyone as a Popsicle!" 

Kagome bit her chapped lip, biting back her retort. If anything happened to La Fay it would be her fault for having brought her to the past to begin with. She turned into the warmth of Inuyasha's chest with a groan. How could a near psychic get lost? Something was very wrong. 

* * * * * * * * * *

La Fay sat under the snow bent branches of an old pine, trying desperately to distinguish anything around her to get home by, but through the sheets of snow there seemed to be nothing. She drew her knees to her, silently praying for a miracle, a sign, anything! 

__

Oh, Gods unnamed for millennia forgotten, freeze not thy last child of Era and the Green Isles. Kind spirits, I prayThe last of the prayer was lost with her consciousness as blackness out of the freezing white fell upon her, bidding her to sleep. Whatever saints or spirits she had been trying to call failed to hear her, the snow whipping relentlessly through the little protection she had. 

La Fay struggled back to consciousness now and then, aware that if she remained, she would freeze, but her blood seemed thick in her veins and the warmth of her dreams was so inviting Waking brought her no feeling at all, not even cold anymore, and she surrendered, lying on her side, head pillowed on one arm, she waited for the hypothermia to set in. It would. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

Sesshoumaru paused to wipe the snow from his tangled silver bangs only to have the wind drive replacement flakes back in again. He huffed a silent surrender and turned to head back to his winter palace, the inspection could wait a day or two, if there were force enough here to trouble him before then he would have found it. 

In mid-step he froze, finding the body of a half frozen human half buried in the snow at the base of a large pine. It wasn't dead, he decided, watching the pitiful creature shudder against the buffeting wind. A small twitch pulled at the corner of his mouth, suddenly reminded of the last human body he had found. Sickened, he pushed forward, back to the entrance of the forest and the palace grounds. 

A stirring behind him made Sesshoumaru hesitate, but he set his jaw and continued in spite of it. 

"H-hey Is s-someone there?" 

Ignoring the voice of the half frozen human, the White Lord continued into the white stained brush. 

La Fay struggled to sit up, cramped and weighed down with snow. She blinked several times, unable to tell if the retreating figure was real or not, partially from the blanketing snow and partially from the snow fever settling in on her mind. 

"Please! Don't j-just" She scrambled to her feet only to have her knees buckle beneath her. She grunted and stood again, finding reserves from the prospect of being saved. She leaned back against her tree for a moment. _Am I really frozen enough to follow a ghost through a blizzard?_ The absence of thought that echoed for a moment in her frozen skull answered. _Yes, yes I am._

Stumbling forward into the full force of the storm, La Fay dragged her feet in the quickly disappearing tracks of the shimmering silver figure barely visible ahead of her. _Athens, I hope the Grim Reaper didn't just get a new look in time to confuse the hell out of me. _

Sesshoumaru growled and forced himself not to look over his shoulder at the pursuing human. _If I could fly in this mess I could lose it easily It's half dead already, it will fall to the storm long before I have to worry about it. _He would have moved faster on that thought but his legs were like lead even in the trail he had forged on his way to the clearing. 

* * * * * * * * *

The icy air felt like glass in her lungs as La Fay picked her way through the treacherously rocky path leading up the steep incline. She guessed through her blind eyes that the trail was little better at any other time of the year but it was only this bad for the ice. Her silent savior continued to ignore her completely as he picked his way through the pass. 

La Fay coughed and fell to one knee but the silver figure ahead still refused to look back. Even she could feel the fever burning in her head but still she pushed herself to her feet, only to fall again. _I'll not die this way._ She swore, grabbing a nearby tree branch to pull herself up by. _I'll at least make it to the gates of hell, stead of freezing in Purgatory._

Sesshoumaru glanced over his shoulder briefly before the human could see him do so. He growled. _It follows._ Climbing the last stretch of slope he slipped just slightly but caught his balance and made it to the crest of the steep incline, not a mountain but nearly. There was a faint curse in the wind and Sesshoumaru paused and looked back. The nearly lifeless creature hung on a low branch of a tree trying to stagger away to return to the trail. The thought of creating a minor avalanche did not escape him but he passed it off, it wasn't worth it. 

La Fay swore again, getting sick of following ghosts and climbing hell's boundaries. "Hey!" She yelled up the pass. "You! Phantom Jerk! Uh-" she stumbled away from the tree. "There's no such thing as a neutral ghost they either help or harm" La Fay grumbled and straightened. Snow whipping her shoulder length blonde hair around her swiftly paling face was weighed down with snow making it impossible to see at all. 

Delirium pressed heavily on her mind, pushing sense from her consciousness, which was also failing fast. La Fay stepped forward, growling audibly. 

__

Live. 

She shivered. That voice was real, dead but real. She didn't like talking to spirits that much so she didn't answer, her head drooping with exhaustion. 

__

Live. 

The voiced ordered again. She tried to place the spirit's voice but it was no one she knew. A child? A girl, maybe five La Fay stumbled another step, shoved by the howling winds. 

__

Live! 

The voice commanded. La Fay felt a surge of last strength and cried into the frozen darkness, magic rippling off of her in waves she'd never thought she possessed. The world was suddenly silent. The wind was stone and snowflakes hung as ornaments in the unmoving air, as if time itself had yielded to the wiccan's cry. 

Sesshoumaru stared; there was nothing else he could do. He had honestly never been shocked in his life, yet this pitiful creature, a human, had astonished him. He could feel power ebbing from her weak body as she silently climbed the pass, the world parting to let her through. He stepped back away from the lip of the crest suddenly struck, unsure, not frightened, but unsure of what the thing actually was. He turned and barked a command as he reached the gate of the palace compound. 

"Let me in! Keep that thing out!" But the guard didn't respond, frozen along with the rest of the universe he heard nothing, saw nothing, not even the creature staggering up the ridge of the mountain. Sesshoumaru gritted his teeth and swiftly jumped the gate, feeling the magic barriers undone to their smallest incantation. As soon as it was over the top of the pass the world resumed its deadly blows on anything foolish enough to move. 

La Fay fell to beating on the gates in the growing darkness of twilight, shouting at the guards who remained out of her sight at their posts. Still she ranted a cursed and barked orders to forgotten spirits to kill the guards and open the gates but in her delirium half of the ancient words were slurred together, distorting meaning and merely pooling earth bound minions in a confusing knot around her until the last of her strength was gone and 

Her cries ceased. Sesshoumaru glared toward the front of the palace with distaste. The, _thing_, had died, he hoped, and it was about time, clamoring on the door for well over an hour after miles of dragging itself blindly through the deadening cold. A shiver shook him violently. The last of her curses must have sent a confused spirit past the reformed barriers after all. He pushed his tea aside, its steam no more comforting than having a frostbitten witch lying dead on his stoop. Straightening, he ordered the small servant woman in the corner to tell the guards to drag it inside and give it a proper burial; he had enough troubles without having a curse on his head. 

__

"Sire, the woman, she yet lives." 

"Impossible!" 

"Nay, Lord. I have seen her breath, though she be weak" 

A growl. "Tell no one of this but the healer. Help him tend her until she can be put back on the frozen rock she materialized from. I want no more part of this than what I have been, understand?" 

"Sire." 

La Fay touched the surface of her consciousness cautiously. When neither bitter cold nor hellfire exploded through her she allowed herself to rise to the skin of her waking mind slowly and carefully, avoiding waking totally for her own sake. _By the blade of Merlin's sword, where the hell am I?_ She thought darkly. She still dare not open her eyes, afraid of the answer. 

Try though she might she could not stand the quiet of wherever she was physically and couldn't seem to submerge her thoughts entirely again. With an inward sigh she let her curiosity grip her and force her lids open slowly. It was dead night in a foreign room she'd never seen before, nor could she see well now. There were no shadows because there was little light to begin with but there was still heavy unease in the air, and not just because she knew not where she was. La Fay sat up, her body promptly responding by dropping her back on the warm futon again under her mountain of fine blankets. She groaned softly, only too aware now that she was too weak to move. She felt her mind cloud and she turned slowly into her pillow and let them fall, sending her back into her dreams. There was nothing to fight now but whatever death might still be trying to cling to her. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

Kagome watched the edge of forest with a beseeching look as she stood in the growing dark outside of Keade's hut. She rubbed her arms and looked up at the unlit, snow laden sky where no moon shown through the dense clouds that persistently bombarded the world with icy flakes of doom for anyone foolish enough to remain outdoors for long. The black haired and violet eyed Inuyasha stepped out next to her, ready to reprimand her for trying to freeze herself with her vigil, but a course cough was dragged out of her suddenly and he stopped, taking her by the elbow and motioning for her to go inside. 

"I'll stand watch, you get some tea in you before you keel over." Inuyasha mumbled, pushing her toward to door. 

Kagome planted her feet and turned on him. "I'm not leaving her out there." She stated flatly. 

Inuyasha rolled his eyes. "Well, duh! That's why I volunteered. Now get your butt into bed it's late. We'll look again in the morning, you can't even see anymore." 

She hesitated. "You sure you'll see her then?" 

"Probably sooner than you would. Now go! Kaede still has some hot stew waiting so go!" 

Kagome concealed a small smile as she turned and entered the small hut. She paused to see Inuyasha take his stance leaning against the side of the house, head turned in the direction of the forest. After a moment she emerged again with a blanket, which she threw at him with a grateful nod. After an unsuccessful hour of night watch, Inuyasha slipped back inside, half frozen, and curled up on the mat beside Kagome's thick sleeping bag with an irritated and weary sigh. 

* * * * * * * * *

Sesshoumaru grimaced at the smell of human in his home, it was too soon for that, not that he ever wanted it there again. He watched the healer retreat silently down the halls as he stood outside of his study. He rubbed his temple. She wasn't human, there was no way one human could have such power, not even in folklore, the only place that they had ever been strong. 

The healer had been tending the thing, whatever it was, for two days until the fever finally broke. It would recover. Sesshoumaru chided himself for his curiosity and desire to at least know what to call it. It didn't matter because she'd be leaving soon anyway. Maybe that was the part that bothered him most, a woman, having so much power in such a weak body. If she had been male he would have killed her, curse or no, yet for her femininity, his hand was unexplainably stayed. 

Why did it make a difference? Because women in his realm didn't even read, power made them independent, dangerous. It was his own fault for thinking because of her sex she would be nothing more than a parasite, much as admitting it was painful. He returned to his study. It didn't matter, there was a thought indeed. 

Sesshoumaru sat down at the desk but barely glanced at the map in front of him. He rubbed his left shoulder. The phantom pains had been intensifying, probably because of the cold. Somehow just the thought of the ice outside made his mind fall to the memory of the woman's eyes when they had snapped open as her half dragged form was taken past him and into the guest chambers he'd prepared for her. She had gasped and murmured something in a strange delirious tongue and gone limp again. Unnerved, Sesshoumaru had immediately turned and strode away to wait for news in another part of the castle. Those eyes had been wild, piercing, captivating the only explanation for their color had been her use of magic, which undoubtedly also caused her ivory skin and exotic gold hair. She was something out of legend, and yet still only a woman, no matter how powerful. 

With a sigh, the Lord of the Western Lands took his saucer of sake and drowned it in one swallow. The alcohol actually reduced his headache over the events of the last few days. Though he was probably drunk by the time he allowed himself to think it Sesshoumaru did acknowledge the idea of keeping the woman until he at least had idea of what she was an some assurance that she would return to whatever hell had sent her to plague him. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

La Fay had spoken to the healer for nearly a quarter of an hour before fatigue made her lie down again. She'd slept through a hypothermia fever and an additional day but it had left her drained of strength, her body ravaged. 

The healer's soft voice had been stiff as he asked, nearly demanding, answers from her, as though seeing to a human was a waste of his time. What was she? Where was she from? Did she have companions with similar powers? The questions were rushed and stupid in her opinion and she stumbled over her answers, only getting half way through before he cut her off with a question only more idiotic than the last. 

When he'd gone a small young youkai woman had come in with a tray of food for her. Her speaking rhythm was paced and sweet, practiced to keep patients calm. She explained to La Fay where she was but couldn't say how she had gotten there. La Fay had only asked because she couldn't remember. After eating and sending the woman away La Fay laid back to think over her situation: 

She was in the house of a noble and powerful youkai lord, that for one reason or another had saved her from the cold. He'd commanded her cared for to be sent on her way when she was well or when he saw fit. 

The last part of the message had alarmed her slightly. If the servants of this lord were so distasteful of humans than certainly he was of a similar mind. The reason for her safety and well being remained unspoken behind one of the hundreds of thin screens in the castle, and she hadn't yet the strength to go looking for it. 

One last thing the small nurse had said at a passing on her way out was, "If the snow keeps up it won't matter and we'll be snowed in for the winter anyway." La Fay pulled her blankets up with a shiver and closed her eyes, feeling as though someone else's were upon her. 

* * * * * * * * *

"Miroku," Sango said quietly as she walked next to the monk as they swept the ice-laden forest. "Do, you think she's still alive? It's been nearly a week and" 

Miroku glanced behind them, trying to make sure the troubled Kagome didn't hear his real opinion. He pursed his lips. "No." 

Sango lowered her eyes but didn't stop. "I still hope, but I think it has little foundation if she didn't make it to a village, but then she'd have been back by now. Oh, Miroku! What if Naraku found her before we did?! That sick bastard would've-" 

"Shh!" Miroku warned as Inuyasha and Kagome looked up from their inspection of the trailside momentarily before returning to work. "Give her another week at least, before we start talking like this in front of Kagome. She already blames herself, if La Fay is dead we must, have faith." 

Sango looked at Miroku, surprised by the out of character comment. He usually only talked like that when he was getting them a free meal but he actually sounded like he meant it. "I suppose so" Sango said quietly. 

* * * * * * * *

Ebony hair and white snow, such a combination the shadow mused. Lifting the shards from the frozen addition to his pains had been easy, and watching her stagger off into the woods to die alone was simply grand! What a lovely tool she had been, but alone and frightened her powers had failed her, otherwise she would have made a fine addition to his team. Wherever she was, her usefulness was over and she had done her part unaware and well. Sitting back in his latest throne from his latest palace, Naraku raised his sake glace to the snowflakes falling outside the open shoji scene. A toast, to a snowy grave. It was such a beautiful night. 

One Last Thing: WATCH MAD MAD HOUSE ON SCIFI CHANAL! 


End file.
